Thursday, December 22, 2011

Since Newt Gingrich seems to have become the latest to become the darling of the ABM (Anyone But Mitt) movement among the know-nothing Tea Party and “Evangelical” Christianist Republicans, let’s take an opportunity to skewer one of his latest platform statements – his response to the call by the WAcKO Iowa group, The FAMiLY LEADER

NEwT: To Bob Vander Plaats and the Executive Board of The FAMiLY LEADER: I appreciate the opportunity to affirm my strong support of the mission of the FAMiLY LEADER by solemnly vowing to defend and strengthen the family through the following actions I would take as President of the United States.

Defending Marriage. As President, I will vigorously enforce the Defense of Marriage Act, which was enacted under my leadership as Speaker of the House, and ensure compliance with its provisions, especially in the military.

JP: The fact that the so-called Defense of Marriage Act is really an assault on states’ rights, an assault on marriage, and actually does nothing to preserve and strengthen marriage, is lost on Newt. DOMA is unconstitutional and likely to be held to be unconstitutional by the courts.

NEwT: I will also aggressively defend the constitutionality of DOMA in federal and state courts.

JP: A waste of taxpayer dollars, to defend a law that should so obviously a violation of the Constitution to anyone who claims to be a constitutional scholar.

NEwT: I will support sending a federal constitutional amendment defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman to the states for ratification.

JP: it’s so rare that constitutional amendments to take away rights are introduced. The last one ushered in Prohibition. The constitutional Amendment we need to see is a reintroduction of the Equal Rights Amendment. It is about time.

NEwT: I will also oppose any judicial, bureaucratic, or legislative effort to define marriage in any manner other than as between one man and one woman. I will support all efforts to reform promptly any uneconomic or anti-marriage aspects of welfare and tax policy. I also pledge to uphold the institution of marriage through personal fidelity to my spouse and respect for the marital bonds of others.

JP: Given Newt’s personal history, “personal fidelity to his spouse” in that “one man/one woman for life” scenario can only mean returning to the first wife he previously abandoned while whoring around with the second, and the third he whored around with while still married to the second, and abandoning the later whores. But he is a whore himself who deserves the serial polygamy he *really* favors. His “one man and one woman”pledge should mean just that – not just serial polygamy, or “one man and one woman at a time.” Oh, but wait, to his adopted Roman Catholic Church, Newt gets a pass, since neither of his earlier marriages are recognized by the pedophile-pandering priests (or any of the other more decent priests) in his Church as having been valid. But don’t all these “Evangelical” Christianist types look at Roman Catholics as “papists” in sort of the same way they see Mormons as pagan idolators? Wouldn't that be especially true since he used to be a white Southern Baptist good ol' boy, and he actually converted to the papist cause? Aren; these the same sort of people who objected to Al Smith and Jack Kennedy?

NEwT: Defending the Unborn. I believe that life begins at conception.

JP: He “believes.” This is important. I will note that this belief that “life begins at conception” has absolutely nothing to do with the idea of when that life is entitled to be considered a human being. Anyone who professes to be a bible-believing Christian and who does not accept the idea that the soul is intimately connected with *breathing* (i.e., the span of a human person’s ensoulment runs from first breath to last only. Even under the English Common Law, which was rather bible-based in many ways, a baby that was born, but did not take a single breath, was not deemed to be a person, but was called stillborn. No inheritance or inheritance rights would pass through such a non-entity. But Newt is one of those people who like the idea of granting full personhood status to inanimate corporations. He would also likely consider the construction plans to be a home, and pans on regulating chicken eggs as if they were fully formed and once-breathing chickens. But his "belief"is consistent with the kind of thing the Pope wants to impose on all Americans.

NEwT: On day one of my administration, I will sign an executive order reinstating Ronald Reagan’s Mexico City policy that prevents taxpayer dollars from being used to fund abortions overseas.

JP: That’s right, Newt “believes” and only his beliefs count. How he can say this, and then claim to defend “Religious Liberty” two points down from this one, is a conflicted position that can only be taken seriously by people who do not have the capacity to understand the fact that these principles are in opposition - such as anyone who might have signed Robbie George and Chuck Colson's bombshell of a Manhattan Declaration. So Newt wants to take way from the religious freedom of women. For Newt, women are a necessary inconvenience, and as an originalist on the Constitution, he believes that women should not be counted, and that African Americans should be returned to a state of involuntary servitude. (See his position on appointing "Originalist" judges!)

NEwT: I will also work with Congress to repeal Obamacare, defund Planned Parenthood so that no taxpayer dollars are being used to fund abortions but rather transfer the money so it is used to promote adoption and other pro-family policies, and enact legislation that provides greater protections for the unborn.

JP: Even the English Common Law recognized that “the unborn” are not people. So protecting the “unborn” means taking away the rights of women who are already born. And so little of Planned Parenthoods budget goes to abortion, Most of it goes to other reproductive health services. I am sure that Newt would rather give taxpayer money to "religious" groups that discriminate against people they don't like.

NEwT: Defending Religious Liberty. As President, I will vigorously defend the First Amendment’s rights of religious liberty and freedom of speech against anyone who would try to stifle the free expression of believers.

JP: Newt wants to impose his religion in everyone, and then comes out with this? This is inconsistent with his policy on women’s reproductive rights. There are women who share my religious belief that is bible based, and consistent with the common law understanding that we are only human beings between first breath and last breath. Our souls are intimately bound up in our breath – and literally, “spirit” and “breath” are the same thing. So, why doesn't our religion count? Is it because Newt only believes that Religious freedom is for people who agree with him?

NEwT: I will also promote legislation that protects the right to conscience for healthcare workers so they are not compelled to perform abortions and other procedures that violate their religious teachings.

JP: how about the religious liberty of healthcare workers whose religious beliefs allow them to participate in assisting women in their reproductive health care. I think that people who have a religious objection to performing their jobs should find another line of work.

NEwT: Defending Against Debt. As President, I will undertake vigorous policies to maximize capital investment and job creation, along with common sense entitlement reforms, to dramatically turn around the nation’s fiscal situation.

JP: This is meaningless drivel. Newt has every intention to line the pockets of fat cats at the expense of the people. He already intends to scuttle child labor laws.

NEwT: Building upon the same principles I championed during my four years as Speaker, when we reduced the national debt by over $400 billion and dramatically reduced the national debt as a percentage of the GDP, we will reduce the enormous burden upon American families of the public debt and unfunded liabilities.

JP: Newt is infamous for being the huckster who designed the program one can only call “The Contract On America” - The only way to fairly accomplish the goal he seeks is to stop the insane defense spending and end the wars. It is a well-known principle since the Vietnam war that America can’t afford to have Guns *AND* Butter.

NEwT: Defending the Right of the People to Rule Themselves. Today, as federal courts have intervened in sectors of American life never before imaginable, including the intervention in the definition of marriage as well as when unborn life can be protected under the Constitution, the public has increasingly come to view them as an usurpative device for unelected rulers.

JP: The real activist judges have ruled that fictitious corporate “people” have the same rights as human beings – the next step is to give corporate entities perpetual voting rights. And the slippery slope will be to give Republican-built robots voting rights (something that they apparently have tried clandestinely in Ohio, with the apparent voting rights of voting machines there). The courts actually exist to protect the *individual* people against the tyranny of the majority – a job they don’t do terribly well because of conservative activism from the bench

NEwT: This abuse of power and loss of public confidence amounts to a constitutional crisis. I believe the executive and legislative branches each have an independent responsibility to interpret the Constitution,

JP: That is true, within their parameters, but the SCOTUS has the final say on constitutionality.

NEwT: and in those rare circumstances when they believe the federal courts, including the Supreme Court, have engaged in a serious constitutional error, they can choose among an array of constitutional powers to check and balance the courts.

JP: The “check and balance” on the SCOTUS is the constitutional amendment process. Is Newt an ass, or what? Since he is a self-proclaimed constitutional scholar, doesn’t he actually know this?

NEwT: As President, I will nominate for federal judgeships, including justices of the Supreme Court, only those individuals who are committed to an originalist understanding of the Constitution. Judges with an originalist understanding will subordinate themselves to the meaning of the Constitution as it was intended by the framers, and not substitute their own judgments about its meaning.

JP: Originalism is an error. Times have changed, and I expect a SCOTUS and federal judges who are more civilized than their predecessors, and more civilized than the Founders, who believed in slavery, and in the oppression of women. Newt is saying tight here that he wants to roll back the interpretation of the Constitution to a point prior to 1870.

NEwT: The inherent judicial self-restraint that comes from an originalist approach to the Constitution offers the best long-term assurance that federal judges will not exceed their powers and trample on individual liberties. I will also work with Congress to use the Constitutional means available to reassert the right of the elected branches of government to defend their understanding of the meaning of the Constitution, including limiting the jurisdiction of the federal courts to decide on certain issues, when they believe the federal courts have engaged in a serious constitutional error.

JP: I think that Newt treads on dangerous ground here. While the courts have traditionally been a drag on progressivism, on occasion they lurch toward civilization. Newt would kill that, and insure that the tyranny of the majority can crush individual rights for people who don’t fit into the majority. Newt is a dangerous demagogue, and a threat to the republic, as dangerous as a mad dog I the streets. If he were to be elected to the presidency, I would fear for the survival of the nation. Gingrich, the Gingrinch, would steal the childhood from children, freedom from women, and human rights from LGBT people.

NEwT: Sincerely, Newt Gingrich

JP: Newt is *anything* but sincere. He is a liar, a cheater, an adulterer, a miserable excuse for a human being, and he has a problem with the meaning of words. His answer to charges of influence peddling was that he was not a “lobbyist.” This fuzzy definition thing is exactly the same kind of thing that he ha the House impeach Bill Clinton for exhibiting – Clinton was technically truthful when he said that he “did not have sexual relations with that woman.” Because what Clinton meant by “sexual relations” was limited to a particular act that he didn’t actually perform. So Gingrich technically tells the truth when he says he was not a “lobbyist” but there are other aspects of influence peddling that he had his hand in once he was gone from Congress. Newt’s hands are stained and unclean. None of the Republican candidates for President are qualified for the job, but Newt has shown himself to be less qualified than Michele Bachmann. He is already committing “high crimes and misdemeanors” under his own definition of the term, well before getting the nomination, much less taking office.